Gulen Schools Worldwide

With the growth of Gulen schools worldwide. We had requests from around the world to start a second blog on the Gulen Turkish Schools worldwide. From Mexico to Iraq, and Africa to Afghanistan we will post the news stories and as usual amuse you at the same time. To contrast and compare we invite you to http://www.gulencharterschoolsUSA.blogspot.com http://www.charterschoolwatchdog.com http://www.charterschoolscandals.blogspot.com

Gulen Schools Worldwide

Restore the Ottoman Caliphate. Disclaimer: if some videos are down this is the result of Gulen censorship which filed a fake copyright infringement to UTUBE.

Friday, August 25, 2017

ISTANBUL — Hundreds of miles away from the turmoil of his native country, Mustafa Emre Çabuk did not expect to become ensnared in Turkey’s ever-expanding purge.

Çabuk, a principal at a Turkish school in neighboring Georgia, had no intention of returning home after spending more than a decade in the Caucasus. But Turkey’s government had other plans.

On a Wednesday morning in May — the day after Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım met his Georgian counterpart Giorgi Kvirikashvili — the Tbilisi police came knocking on Çabuk’s door to detain him. Ankara had requested his extradition to put him on trial for terrorism.

Since President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan vowed to “cleanse” his country of its enemies following last year’s attempted coup, Turkey’s purge has gradually expanded beyond its own borders.

Within Turkey, more than 55,000 citizens have been jailed over links to the U.S.-based imam Fethullah Gülen, whom Ankara accuses of orchestrating the failed coup. At the same time, Turkey’s mission to eradicate Gülen’s influence has taken on global dimensions — an effort government officials describe as increasingly important.

Turkey invariably charges all Gülen supporters with membership of a terrorist organization, even if the case relies on guilt by association.

“The ultimate target for the Turkish government is to bring persons with ties to the failed coup attempt and/or the Gülenist terrorist organization back home to face trial because the whole nation, especially the families of the 250 people killed and the thousands of casualties, expects the government to judge them,” Yunus Akbaba, an advisor to Yildirim, told POLITICO.

Hundreds of Turks accused of links to Gülen fled abroad after the coup attempt, but the exiled cleric’s secretive movement — which Ankara has classified as a terror organization — also has a long history of activity abroad, running a vast network of schools, universities, charities, media outlets and businesses around the world.

“This organization somehow managed to take their members out of Turkey before and after the coup,” said Akbaba. As long as fugitive Gülen suspects remained free, Turkey could not achieve real results in its fight against the movement, he added.

Among Western countries, Turkey’s pleas have largely fallen on deaf ears, much to Erdoğan’s dismay. The president has repeatedly lashed out at Europe and the U.S. for refusing to extradite Gülen and his followers.

Elsewhere, Ankara has had more luck. In May, Malaysia and Saudi Arabia handed Gülen suspects over to Turkey; several countries have shut down schools linked to Gülen after coming under pressure from the Turkish government.

Guilty by association

Mustafa Emre Çabuk’s school, the Demirel College in Tbilisi, remains open for now. But earlier this year, the Georgian government closed down Çabuk’s old workplace, another Gülen-linked school in the Black Sea resort of Batumi.

Turkey invariably charges all Gülen supporters with membership of a terrorist organization, even if the case relies on guilt by association. Çabuk was no exception.

Given the serious allegations, he was sentenced to three months in pre-extradition detention on May 25. Georgia denied his request for asylum; later in August, he will appear before a judge to fight his extradition.

“Facing a terror charge requires getting involved in a terror act,” said his wife Tuba. She insisted her husband had committed no such crime. Ankara’s charge partially rests on the allegation that Çabuk aided a Demirel College shareholder in selling shares to a U.S.-based institution believed to have links to Gülen.

Fearing for her husband’s safety, Tuba Çabuk hopes the Georgian government will deny Turkey’s request. “People are being unjustly jailed there and they face torture,” she said of her home country. “If my husband is returned to Turkey, he will face serious problems.”

Amnesty International has called on Georgia — which aspires to join the European Union — not to extradite Çabuk, citing “risk of torture or other ill-treatment, unfair trial or other serious human right violations.” But much is at stake for Tbilisi: Turkey is Georgia’s largest trade partner.

“My husband is a kind man, but they talked as if they’d captured Pablo Escobar” — Kamuran Tıbık

In Turkey itself, cases like Çabuk’s generate little sympathy. The Gülen movement’s wealth, coupled with its interlinked structure and its decades-long infiltration of the Turkish state, have led some critics to liken it to a mafia organisation.

The movement’s supporters, on the other hand, claim it is a peaceful, loosely connected group advocating liberal Islam. In many countries, their schools and colleges enjoy a good reputation. But most Turks, both government supporters and opponents, regard the Gülen movement with suspicion.

Missing in Malaysia

While attempting to coax countries into shutting down schools and extraditing suspects, Turkey has found other ways of making life abroad more difficult for Gülenists.

Ankara has cancelled numerous passports, a strategy that came to international attention in May when Enes Kanter, a player in the NBA, the American professional basketball league, was detained at a Romanian airport after Turkey annulled his travel documents. Kanter has been openly supportive of Gülen.

In June, the government threatened to strip 130 fugitive suspects of their citizenship, effectively rendering them stateless, if they did not return. Several European media outlets have reported on Turks having their passports seized upon visiting Turkish diplomatic missions.

And while the Turkish government has so far pursued legal avenues to return suspected Gülenists, family members of two Turkish citizens deported from Malaysia have accused Ankara of circumventing international law entirely.

In October last year, Kamuran Tıbık reported her husband missing in Kuala Lumpur. Tamer Tıbık, a Turkish businessman with links to Gülen, failed to return home from a language course and did not answer calls.

The Tıbık family had relocated to the Malaysian capital a year earlier, unnerved by the Turkish government’s crackdown on Gülen-linked businesses, which preceded the current purge. Thousands of miles from Ankara, they felt safe.

Within Turkey, more than 55,000 citizens have been jailed over links to the U.S.-based imam Fethullah Gülen | Selahattin Sevi/Zaman Daily News via EPA

But on October 13, Tamer Tıbık was nowhere to be found. His wife and friends looked for him in hospitals and police stations, to no avail. Tıbık’s neighbour Alettin Duman, described by Ankara as the “imam” or local leader of the Gülen movement in Malaysia, was also missing.

Two days later, Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, the Turkish foreign minister, announced thatMalaysia had handed over “terrorists” upon Turkey’s request. “Our fight against them will continue till the end, both inland and abroad,” he said.

“His passport was still at home. We understood then that he was abducted,” Kamuran Tıbık said. Çavuşoğlu’s speech struck her as surreal: “My husband is a kind man, but they talked as if they’d captured Pablo Escobar.”

Terrified, she fled Malaysia with her daughters three days after her husband’s disappearance. They have since been granted asylum; she has asked for the country to be withheld out of concern for her family’s safety.

For weeks, they had no information about her husband’s whereabouts, until her mother-in-law located Tamer in a detention centre in Ankara. In a letter, he told his wife that his kidnappers took him to a forest in Malaysia, where they interrogated and tortured him.

From Duman’s mother, Kamuran Tıbık heard the maltreatment continued after the men arrived in Turkey: “She said they were tortured in a gym hall for some weeks. They beat them and denied them food.” With their case ongoing, they remain in jail.

“There was no court hearing in Malaysia, nothing” — İsmet Özçelik

Akbaba, the Turkish prime minister’s adviser, denied Turkey had taken illegal action, claiming that Ankara had cancelled Tıbık and Duman’s passports and Malaysia had deported them for staying in the country illegally.

“Claims that Turkey uses illegal methods or acts underhandedly to extradite suspects are total nonsense,” he said. “If it were the case, the number of members of the Gülenist terror organization extradited to Turkey would not be just a few.”

“Even though we are not happy with our allies’ attitudes on this — indeed, there has been no extradition from the U.S. or most European allies up until now — we never apply any outlawed methods,” added Akbaba. “Torture is a serious crime and we are strictly against it.”

‘No court hearing, nothing’

Tıbık and Duman were not the only Turks the Malaysian government handed over to Ankara; in May, three other Turkish citizens accused of links to Gülen — an academic, a teacher and a businessman — were also deported.

The academic, İsmet Özçelik, had left Turkey shortly after the coup attempt and moved to Kuala Lumpur, where his elder son taught at a Gülen-linked school. In early May, while in a car with his son and others, they were stopped and he was taken by a group of unidentified men.

Two days earlier, two other Turkish citizens were kidnapped in a similar fashion, according to their lawyers. The Malaysian interior minister subsequently said they had been detained for connections to Islamic State, while the Turkish pro-government media identified them as terrorists linked to Gülen. The trio were deported a week later.

“There was no court hearing in Malaysia, nothing,” said Suat Özçelik, Ismet’s younger son, who worked at the flagship pro-Gülen newspaper Zaman before fleeing Turkey last year. He added that his father was listed as a person of concern by the United Nations Refugee Agency in Malaysia. (UNHCR did not respond to requests for confirmation.)

Suat and other members of the Özçelik family have applied for asylum in a European country, but he requested that their whereabouts be kept secret. Even in Europe, he does not feel safe from the long arm of the Turkish state.

He has cause to worry. In early August, Spanish police stopped Hamza Yalçin, a writer for a leftist Turkish magazine, at Barcelona airport and detained him pending extradition.

Yalcin, who emigrated to Sweden in 1984, has no known connections to Gülen, but is sought by Turkey for alleged links to the far-left terror group DHKP/C, according to Spanish media. The Committee to Protect Journalists has called for his immediate release.

Friday, August 18, 2017

Mali Gulen Turkish schools will change ownership and teachers, the country is kicking the CIA gulen members out.

Schools belong to Gülenist Terror Group (FETÖ) in Mali were taken over by Turkey's Maarif Foundation in line with an agreement signed between the Malian National Education Ministry and the foundation.

The ceremony that was held in Mali's capital, Bamako, to mark the takeover was attended by both Malian and Turkish officials. The agreement, which envisages transferring the 18 schools linked with FETÖ, was signed by Malian National Education Minister Ag Erlaf and Maarif Foundation board member Hasan Yavuz. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan also sent a letter regarding the takeover to Malian President Boubacar Keita.

"We do not let any structure harm our bilateral relations. We completely come to agreement with the Turkish government on FETÖ. Mali stands by Turkey against all kind of terrorism. And we are aware of Turkey likewise standing by us. I will send a special representative in response to my brother President Erdoğan's letter," Boubacar has said.

Some 3,297 students attend the schools, which have 406 teachers, 33 of whom are Turkish. The new academic year begins in October.

Nineteen African countries have handed over FETÖ schools to Turkey's Maarif Foundation or closed them upon Ankara's request.

The Maarif Foundation was established after the July 2016 coup attempt in order to take over the administration of overseas schools linked to FETÖ, which Ankara accuses of being behind the failed coup that left 248 people dead and nearly 2,200 injured.

An operation against the Gülenist Terror Group's (FETÖ) St.Petersburg establishments, "Oxford Vision" and the "Russian-Turkish Cultural Center," has been launched by the Russian authorities, Anadolu Agency reported yesterday.

During the inspections, which have been conducted since May by the Russian Ministry of Finance into emergency situations and employment and migration at the FETÖ-linked Oxford Vision language school and the Russian-Turkish Culture Center, the authorities identified a large number of violations of the law, the report said.

According to the Russian news agency RIA Novosti's news, following the identifications, both institutions received hefty fines. The suspects, one of whom is the founder of the Russian-Turkish Culture Center, Adnan Öztürk, while the other is an instructor at Oxford Vision, Eşref Sarışahin, were detained due to claims that they offered bribes to the authorities that conducted the inspection.

Since 2013, both FETÖ-linked institutions have established their activities in several locations in Russia. Yet, according to the information that AA received from the authorities, both institutions have been dormant for one-and-a-half years, while inspections against the institutions have increased due to denunciations, and numerous irregularities in their activities have been discovered by the Russian authorities.

Authorities further stated that the FETÖ-linked institutions will be shut down with a court order or the institutions will close themselves down.

Turkey has asked countries to close FETÖ-linked schools, colleges and businesses following the attempted coup that left 249 people dead on July 15. The group, led by U.S.-based Fetullah Gülen, has a large network of overseas educational and commercial interests.

Schools, businesses and "Gulen institutes" dialogue centers to be closed!!!!

The Turkish authorities’ fight against real and imagined enemies in the Gülen movement has now reached Azerbaijan and Georgia.

A group of AKP party supporters protest the attempted military coup against the Turkish government, allegedly supported by the cleric Fethullah Gülen and his organisation. Saracahane Park, Istanbul, July 2016. Photo (c) Depo Photos/ABACA/PA Images. All rights reserved.

The European Parliament has passed a resolution expressing “serious concern” on the case of the Azerbaijani investigative journalist Afgan Mukhtarli, who was abducted from Tbilisi late May, only to appear before a court in Azerbaijan’s capital Baku some days later. But the spotlight has yet to fall on another case in Georgia: Mustafa Emre Çabuk, a Turkish schoolteacher, still sits in Gldani prison in the Georgian capital, where an uncertain fate awaits him.

Ankara has repeatedly accused Çabuk of “supporting terrorism” in reference to his alleged links with the Hizmet movement associated with Fethullah Gülen, the Turkish Muslim preacher and philanthropist based in the US. Çabuk, who has lived in Georgia for 15 years, is now at imminent risk of extradition to Turkey where, judging by similar cases, he is at risk of being tortured.

Çabuk, who has lived in Georgia for 15 years, now risks of extradition to Turkey where he risks being tortured

Çabuk first came to Georgia in 2002 to work as a physics teacher at the Refaiddin Şahin Friendship School in Batumi, which was shut down earlier this year by Georgia’s National Center for Education Quality Enhancement (NCEQE). The Georgian authorities’ decision came shortly after Turkish officials criticised the Gülen-run school, which teaches five to 12-year olds, calling it an institution “serving a terrorist group.”

The price of a good education

At the order of president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Turkish officials and diplomats have made appeals worldwide calling on governments to close down Gülen schools abroad. The Turkish government insists that this network of schools poses a national security threat, and has classified the Gülen network as a terrorist group.

FETÖ, as the Turkish government calls the Gülen movement’s “terrorist network”, is accused of plotting last year’s failed coup on 15 July. Calling the events a “a gift from God,” Erdoğan promised that those responsible would “pay a heavy price.” Those who feared the coup would provide a pretext to crack down on all dissident have been proved right. Not only Gülen followers, but Turkish liberals, secular democrats and journalists have been arrested, with many more tortured in detention and fired from their jobs. Over the months following the coup, Turkey has arrested more than 40,000 people and sacked or suspended more than 100,000 in the military, civil service and private sector. Turkish nationals working in Gülen-affiliated schools worldwide now fear repatriation and prefer either to apply for a political asylum in their host country or to try their luck in the EU or USA.

Çabuk has found himself in a similar situation. In 2007, he started work as director of the Niko Nikoladze High School in Kutaisi, western Georgia. From 2012 until 2016, Çabuk served as deputy general director of all Gülen schools in Georgia.

“Under his watch, many students from our school were successful after having participated at different national and international scientific Olympiads,” a teacher from the closed Şahin Friendship School recalls. The teacher, who wishes to remain anonymous over fears of retribution, underlines that the schools’ quality of education improved directly after Çabuk’s appointment. The teacher simply couldn’t believe how “an accomplished educator” such as Çabuk “might be labeled as a terrorist.”

On 24 May, the Georgian authorities launched an extradition procedure against Çabuk at the official request of Turkey. According to information provided by the Turkish prosecutor, Çabuk is wanted for committing a crime as defined by Article 314/2 of Turkey’s Criminal Code: membership of the FETÖ terrorist organisation (recognised as such only by Turkey). Information obtained by openDemocracy shows that he, with the permission of the directors, wanted to sell 60% of shares of the Tbilisi-based Demirel private school to Metropolitan Education and Consultation Services, a company registered in the USA.

The documentation that supposedly incriminates Çabuk mostly describes the activities of the Gülen movement in Turkey. It does not specify why either Çabuk’s role at the school or his deal with the American company on its behalf constitute a link to terrorist activities and organisations. “Precisely for these reasons, we believe that the charges are entirely unsubstantiated and politically motivated,” concludes Tamta Mikeladze, civil and political rights program director at Tbilisi’s Human Rights Education and Monitoring Centre.

Settling scores

Georgia’s Minister of Education Aleksandre Jejelava has publicly denied any official request from the Turkish side to detain Çabuk but instead says they are “doing their best to defend students from ideological pressure.” During the press conference with Yıldırım, Prime Minister Kvirikashvili, recalling last year’s failed coup in Turkey, was quoted by the pro-government daily Sabah as saying that, “we have to remove the main sources of terror here [in Georgia]. We have to fight with these sources in the wider region, then we must develop our economic and business partnerships.”

Çabuk’s case, just like Mukhtarli’s, is yet another test for Georgia’s commitment to democratic values

On 25 May, Tbilisi City Court sentenced Çabuk to three months’ imprisonment, pending extradition. “He’s been in prison for more than a month, and the charge is both scary and ridiculous," says Çabuk’s wife, Tuğba, who adds she still has faith in Georgia’s commitment to democracy. “Georgia is a country that is at the door of the democratic European Union rather than one where democracy has already seen its end.” She has publicly called for the Georgian government not to bow to pressure from Ankara, and has herself requested protection from the Georgian authorities, fearing reprisals.

The case of Mustafa Çabuk, as well as those of journalists and activists from Azerbaijan, is yet another test for Georgia’s commitment to democratic values. Mikeladze adds that due to political loyalty to neighbouring states, the Georgian government “risks denying the protection of fundamental human rights to foreign citizens desperately in need of them, which in turn harms building a democratic state based on the same principles here at home.”

Demirel College in the Georgian capital of Tbilisi, where Mustafa Çabuk worked as a manager and teacher. Photo CC: WikiMapia. Some rights reserved.

This kind of political bargaining is common between Turkey and South Caucasus states. After all, Gülen schools were welcomed throughout the region from the early 1990s. With the fall of the Iron Curtain, Georgia became the first country that welcomed representatives of Gülen’s movement, though the Azerbaijani city of Nakhchivan was the first place outside Turkey to host a Gülen-affiliated school. Until the purge, some 13 Gülen-funded schools and the now nationalised Qafqaz University functioned in Azerbaijan. The movement’s schools now operate in 160 countries worldwide.

After Turkey’s AKP government restored its power following last year’s coup, Ankara initiated a purge against all Gülen followers in the Caucasus and Central Asia. As a strongly authoritarian state and long-time ally of Turkey, Azerbaijan was only too eager to oblige — Baku’s solution was to nationalise the schools. The attitude of the Central Asian republics, with whom Turkey has maintained strong economic and political ties since their independence, was far from united. Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan pushed back against the Turkish demand to pursue Gülenists. Turkmenistan played ball, launching a massive crackdown against all followers of Gülen in the country, while Uzbekistan never welcomed the Turkish schools in the first place. Tajikistan closed the last of its Gülen schools in 2015, though that could be explained as part of a wider campaign against all Islamic groups in the country.

Pressure points

What power, exactly, does Ankara have over Georgia? As Giorgi Badridze, senior fellow at the Georgian Foundation for Strategic and International Studies (GFSIS) puts it, Turkey is one of Georgia’s most important strategic partners. “In a world where our largest neighbour, Russia, puts us under constant military and economic pressure, Turkey plays a vital role both politically and economically. This doesn’t mean that Georgia should disregard the rule of law for the sake of good relations, but if Turkey’s official request is found to be lawful and within the framework of bilateral agreements, then it can’t be ignored.”

It seems clear that Ankara has already put enormous pressure on Tbilisi to close Gülenist schools and deport Turks working at them. Azerbaijani journalist Mahir Zeynalov, chief editor of the Globe Post who was deported from Turkey for a tweet critical of Erdoğan in 2014, echoes Badridze’s view. Zeynalov stresses that it’s difficult for Georgia to ignore demands from Turkey, its largest friendly neighbour and the country’s second largest trading partner after the EU. Turkish money has flowed into a series of infrastructure projects in Georgia, and is particularly influential in the western province of Ajara.

It’s difficult for Georgia to ignore demands from Turkey, its largest friendly neighbour and the country’s second largest trading partner after the EU

The Georgian Young Lawyers’ Association has monitored Çabuk’s case and believes that the court ruling for a provisional arrest falls short of the standards established under the Georgian legislation and the European Convention. The prosecutor declared that Çabuk could otherwise flee the country and continue his “criminal activities”, but did not give any grounds for these fears.

“The court’s decision is not well-founded,” says Vakhtang Kvizhinadze, Çabuk’s lawyer, adding that his appeal against it was in vain. The decision was kept in force despite the fact that Çabuk has lived in Georgia for years and has a residency permit. “Mustafa did not evade any of his obligations before the court,” Kvizhinadze says.

According to his wife, when the police came to arrest Çabuk on the morning of 24 May, they informed him that the Georgian authorities had no problem with him, but that his arrest was requested by Turkey. “We didn’t even go to Turkey for 17 months, but now my husband is blamed for terrorist activities and a coup attempt,” sighs Tuğba Çabuk.

Good neighbours on the Black Sea. Batumi, capital of Georgia’s autonomous region of Ajara, which is heavily dependent on Turkish investment. As one of Georgia’s largest trading partners, Turkey is involved in several large infrastructure projects, from airports to dams and railways. Photo (c): Alexander Chichurin / RIA Novosti. All rights reserved.

Georgian legislation allows the courts to imprison somebody wanted by foreign law enforcement agencies, but only as a last resort and never as a punitive method. Çabuk could have been released on bail after handing over his passport and a cash payment of bail of GEL 10,000 (£3,248). When he tried, the court refused.

“Unless Mustafa can get refugee status or citizenship, then yes, he might be extradited," underlines Kvizhinadze. “Failing that, Tbilisi could always press Ankara to guarantee that Çabuk’s human rights will be respected in Turkey.”

Under Article 28 of the Law of Georgia on International Cooperation in Criminal Matters, Georgia has the right to refuse an extradition if the crime concerned has been fully or partially committed on the country’s territory, as was Çabuk’s alleged crime concerning the Demirel school. Article 35 of the Treaty between Georgia and Turkey on mutual legal assistance in civil, trade and criminal matters states much the same.

“I’m not sure how eager the Georgian government is to hand Çabuk over to the Turkish authorities, particularly given how the Mukhtarli scandal damaged Georgia's international reputation,” says Badridze, who hopes that the court’s final decision will be guided by legal considerations and not by politics.

Déjà vu in Baku

Çabuk’s colleague Taci Şentürk, a manager at the Turkish Istek school in Baku, was detained on 7 June. Once he was able to call his family, Şentürk told his spouse Fatma that he was to be sent to Turkey. He proposed that his family come to the airport to meet for the last time. “The policemen did not let my husband give one last kiss to our kids, nor could our lawyer meet him," Fatma Şentürk told me, adding that the only reason they were given was the sudden invalidation of Taci’s passport. The Şentürks’ residency permit in Azerbaijan was due to expire on 7 September this year.

There is no official information as to why Taci’s passport was invalidated, despite his having the right of residency in Azerbaijan. The question must now be raised how Taci Şentürk was supposed to have entered Turkey without a valid travel document.

Just 20 minutes before takeoff, Fatma says, a representative of the UN office in Baku arrived and demanded that Taci Şentürk be removed from the plane on the grounds that he and his family were now under the protection of UNHCR’s Baku Office. But after Şentürk was taken off the plane, the representative did not accompany him home. “Police were waiting for him at the airport terminal, and returned him to their organised crime department,” adds Fatma. “Despite my insistence that Taci might be sent to Turkey, the UN delegation couldn’t do anything,” says Fatma Şentürk. Her husband was eventually sent to Turkey on 8 June. Şentürk is now being interrogated in Turkey’s directorate for combatting smuggling and organised crime in Konya.

Taci Şentürk. A Turkish teacher working in Azerbaijan’s capital, Şentürk’s deportation to was stopped at the last minute by UN officials, though it is believed he has been extradited to Turkey regardless. Photo courtesy of the Stockholm Centre for Freedom. All rights reserved.

Fatma Şentürk now wants to leave Azerbaijan as she no longer feels safe there. “Even with the UN protection letter, our safety is not guaranteed,” she adds. “Taci always believed that the Azerbaijanis were our brothers and so would not betray us, but it happened. Even our Azerbaijani lawyer refused to take on the case, saying it was politically-motivated and so might endanger his security too.”

Independent lawyer Samed Rahimli, who will bring Taci Şentürk’s case to the European Court of Human Rights, says that Şentürk’s case is remarkable — he was extradited to Turkey without any legal procedure. “UN protection was completely ignored by the Azerbaijani authorities,” says Rahimli.

Şentürk is not the first Turkish national who was deported from Azerbaijan in this manner. On 6 June, Muharrem Menekşe, a member of the Gülen movement, was sent to Istanbul without any legal grounds. Menekşe had lived in Baku since the early 1990s, where he ran a small business.

Rahimli adds that there was no official charge or formal process from the Turkish authorities in either case: “Ankara just gave the order, and Azerbaijan executed it.” A similar fate befell the Azerbaijani opposition journalist Rauf Mirgadirov, who was deported to Azerbaijan from Turkey, where he lived and worked, in 2014.

There was no formal charge from the Turkish authorities in either the Şentürk or Menekşe’s deportation: Ankara just gave the order, and Azerbaijan executed it.

“Erdogan and Aliyev have long rode roughshod over the laws because of their own interests,” says Ulvi Hasanli, a board member of the N!DA youth movement. “There may be other cases of which we are unaware.” That Ankara and Baku are so prepared to trade favours shows a convergence of regime interests rather than strictly national ones. But it was not always so. Erdoğan’s deteriorating international image as well as his vow to getting rid of his archenemy Gülen has made Azerbaijan and Turkey even closer allies in fighting dissent.

In Azerbaijan, few people appear to care about Taci Şentürk’s fate. When I approached Baku residents, almost none of them knew of Taci Şentürk. Most were surprised to hear about the deportation of a Turkish national; as Azerbaijanis and Turks share many cultural ties, mistreating a Turkish citizen could be considered shameful by Azerbaijanis.

The ruling on whether Çabuk will receive political asylum in Georgia will be made on Friday — the extradition process has been put on hold while his asylum application is being considered. The ultimate decision on whether he will be deported to Turkey to face (in)justice will be made in a final trial to be held after 24 August, after his three months’ detention comes to an end.

Between 2007 and 2016, Ankara made almost 399 extradition requests to western European countries, though only 11 have been granted (including nine by EU Member States). These include requests for the extradition of 59 participants in the coup attempt of 15 July. Germany has refused to expel 22 individuals linked with Gülen. In Greece, civil society protest over Turkey’s extradition bid request led to a Supreme Court ruling against it.

Wealthy and influential western European countries can afford to reject extradition requests made by the Turkish government. But Azerbaijan and Georgia probably cannot. Neither wants to harm their relationship with Turkey, which is an important corridor to the west and regional counterbalance against Russia. Ankara’s hunt for Gülen may prove a test of how the two states can defend their sovereignty. That is, if they’re interested.

Monday, June 5, 2017

The Foreign Ministry of the West African nation of Sierra Leone has agreed to turn over the four FETÖ schools in the country to the Turkey Maarif Foundation (TMV), a body founded to support education and academic activity abroad.
TMV Deputy Chairman Ambassador Dr. Hasan Yavuz told Anadolu Agency that Turkey's Accra Ambassador Nesrin Beyazıt and TMV Africa Board Expert İbrahim Baran had been in contact with Ghana and Sierra Leone on the issue of FETÖ schools in the two countries.
As a result of the meetings with Sierra Leone President Ernest Bai Koromo and Foreign Minister Samura Kamara, the country's foreign ministry gave written indication that they would turn over the schools to the TMV.
Yavuz reported that President Koroma said, "We will never shelter any element that commits terrorist crimes against the people and state of Turkey. We have canceled all permits for these institutions. It is our desire for TMV to reorganize our country from primary school to university." The TMV schools plan to open their doors in September, Yavuz added.
During a previous meeting with top-level administrators and ministers in Ghana, Yavuz said the country had also showed legal documents relating to the FETÖ organization's activities.
Sierra Leone is the latest in a string of African countries to agree to Turkey's demands over FETÖ schools. Previously the Republic of Congo, Somalia, Guineau, Niger and Sudan turned over FETÖ schools the TMV, while Burundi, Senegal, Mauritania, Chad, Gabon, Burkina Faso, the Central African Republic, and Madagascar have signed agreements about turning over of FETÖ schools their respective countries. Djibouti and Sao Tome have also signed agreements for the opening of Maarif Schools.

The only Gülenist Terror Group (FETÖ)-linked school in Rwanda has shut down, Rwandan Minister of Education Papias Musafiri Malimba confirmed on Friday.

According to Anadolu Agency, Malimba gave the instructions to shut down the school in a written statement. He said that they also decided to take necessary precautions against the school's activities since they take Turkey's desires and the benefits of Rwanda into consideration.
Hope Academy was founded in 2012, to provide education to children from high-income families.
Last month, Rwandan ministers said that they were ready to provide all types of assistance to Turkey in its fight against FETÖ. "We will not allow any activities to be carried out against the Turkish state in this country," Foreign Minister Louise Mushikiwabo told Anadolu Agency, adding that Rwanda has a clear stance regarding FETÖ and will not allow the group to do business.
The foreign minister also said that Rwanda will not let FETÖ supporters, who disregard laws in Turkey, to take shelter in the country. "Rwanda is not a safe haven for people who inflict damage on Turkey, a country we consider a friend," Mushikiwabo said.
Rwandan Minister of Commerce and Industry François Kanimba also said that the country is ready to "fully cooperate" with Turkey concerning business activities of FETÖ supporters.
"We want to continue to cooperate with Turkey because our relations with Turkey are strategic and significant," the minister said.FETÖ faces heightened scrutiny after being accused of attempting to topple the democratically elected Turkish government in the July 15 coup attempt in which 246 people were killed and 2,200 injured.
Rwanda is one of several countries to have taken action following the July 15 coup attempt regarding confiscating FETÖ schools and transferring ownership to the Turkish Maarif Foundation.
Meanwhile, the West African nation Sierra Leone's foreign ministry has agreed to turn over the four FETÖ schools in the country to the Turkey Maarif Foundation (TMV), a body founded to support education and academic activity abroad.
Sierra Leone is the latest in a string of African countries to agree to Turkey's demands over FETÖ schools.
Previously the Republic of Congo, Somalia, Guineau, Niger and Sudan turned over FETÖ schools to the TMV, while Burundi, Senegal, Mauritania, Chad, Gabon, Burkina Faso, the Central African Republic, and Madagascar have signed agreements to turn over FETÖ-run schools.
Additionally, Djibouti and Sao Tome have signed agreements for the opening of Maarif schools in the upcoming period.